Nature 2nd September
Transgenerational induction of defences in animals and plants
ANURAG A. AGRAWAL, CHRISTIAN LAFORSCH & RALPH TOLLRIAN
Predators are potent agents of natural selection in biological communities.
Experimental
studies have shown that the introduction of predators can cause rapid
evolution of defensive
morphologies and behaviours in prey and chemical defences in plants. Such
defences may be
constitutively expressed (phenotypically fixed) or induced when predators
initially attack. Here we show that non-lethal exposure of an animal to
carnivores, and a plant to a herbivore, not only induces a defence, but
causes the attacked organisms to produce offspring that are better defended
than offspring from unthreatened parents. This transgenerational effect,
referred to as a maternally induced defence, is in contrast to the more
common defences induced in single individuals within a generation.
Transgenerational induction of defences is a new level of phenotypic
plasticity across generations that may be an important component of
predator-prey interactions.
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